About our e-newsletters
- Free e-newsletters
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- We do not share your e-mail address
Housecall, our weekly general-interest e-newsletter, keeps you up to date on a wide variety of health topics with timely, reliable, practical information, recipes, blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts and more. Our biweekly topic-specific e-newsletters also include blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts, and other useful information that will help you manage your health.
Housecall Archives
Mayo Clinic Housecall
Stay up to date on the latest health information.
What you get
- Free weekly e-newsletter
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- Recipes, tools and other helpful information
- We do not share your e-mail address
Tests and diagnosis
By Mayo Clinic staffLyme disease has many nonspecific symptoms that often are found in other conditions, such as viral infections, various joint disorders, fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue syndrome and even depression. Sometimes, these common conditions are misdiagnosed as Lyme disease. What's more, the ticks that transmit Lyme disease also can spread other diseases at the same time.
If you don't have the characteristic Lyme disease rash, your doctor may ask detailed questions about your medical history and do a physical exam. Lab tests to identify antibodies to the bacteria may be used to help confirm the diagnosis. These tests are most reliable a few weeks after an infection, after your body has time to develop antibodies. They include:
- Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) test. The test used most often to detect Lyme disease, ELISA detects antibodies to B. burgdorferi. But because it can sometimes provide false-positive results, it's not used as the sole basis for diagnosis.
- Western blot test. If the ELISA test is positive, another test — the Western blot — is usually done to confirm the diagnosis. The Western blot detects antibodies to several proteins of B. burgdorferi.
- Polymerase chain reaction (PCR). This test helps detect bacterial DNA in fluid drawn from an infected joint. It's not as effective at detecting infection of blood or urine. It's used for people who may have chronic Lyme arthritis. It may also be used to detect persistent infection in the cerebrospinal fluid of people who have nervous system symptoms.
- Hu L. Treatment of Lyme disease. http://www.uptodate.com/home/index.html. Accessed March 24, 2010.
- Hu L. Clinical manifestations of Lyme disease in adults. http://www.uptodate.com/home/index.html. Accessed March 24, 2010.
- Lyme disease. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dvbid/lyme/index.htm. Accessed March 24, 2010.
- FDA warns consumers and health care providers not to use bismacine, also known as chromacine. U.S. Food and Drug Administration. http://www.fda.gov/Safety/MedWatch/SafetyInformation/SafetyAlertsforHumanMedicalProducts/ucm150503.htm. Accessed March 29, 2010.
- Wormser GP, et al. The clinical assessment, treatment and prevention of Lyme disease, human granulocytic anaplasmosis and babesiosis: Clinical practice guidelines. Infectious Disease Society of America. 2006;43:1089.
- Lyme disease. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. http://www3.niaid.nih.gov/topics/lymeDisease/understanding/. Accessed March 25, 2010.
- Lyme disease: The facts, the challenge. www3.niaid.nih.gov/topics/lymeDisease/PDF/LymeDisease.pdf. Accessed March 29, 2010.
Find Mayo Clinic on